


I Think the Dead Thing is Me

by HunterusHeroicus



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, POV Outsider, Road Trips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-05
Updated: 2017-08-05
Packaged: 2018-12-11 06:30:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11708769
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HunterusHeroicus/pseuds/HunterusHeroicus
Summary: After the war, Harry takes some time to himself. Someone helps him out along the way.





	I Think the Dead Thing is Me

**Author's Note:**

  * For [yet_intrepid](https://archiveofourown.org/users/yet_intrepid/gifts).



Sam had been standing in the heat for hours before a car finally stopped at the side of the freeway. A Ford Anglia, beat up and blue with the windows rolled down.

“Need a ride?” The driver asked. He had a British accent, and skin as brown as the dust in Iraq. Although, Sam thought, he didn’t look Iraqi.

“Yeah, please,” Sam replied. He picked up his bag, swiping at it to clear some of the dust before settling it on his shoulder. “Where do you want this?”

The driver got out to open the trunk for him, and Sam realised he couldn’t be older than twenty. His rolled-up jeans hung low on skinny hips, and he had to pull them up twice before he got back in the car. Sam opened the passenger seat door and sat down. It was surprisingly comfortable, colder inside than any than any car had the right to be in this weather.

“I’m Harry,” the kid said. He glanced at the dashboard before pulling away from the curb and merging back onto the freeway. It seemed to have a few more buttons than Sam was used to, but that could be a European thing. Maybe Ford did things different across the ocean.

“Sam,” Sam replied. “Where’re you headed?

Harry shrugged. “Just been driving, mostly.” He pushed a hand through his hair, making the ends stick up like he’d been struck by lightening. Sam caught a glimpse of a scar that the hair had been covering. “Where do you want to go?”

Sam hesitated. He’d been going vaguely west for about a week now. “North?”

Harry grinned at him. “North it is.” He fiddled with a dial on the dashboard, and the radio burst into life.

“The Pixies,” said Sam, “nice.”

Harry looked at him for a moment before facing the road once more. “Is that what they’re called?” He smiled again, a private smile that Sam didn’t quite like seeing on such a young face.

“Yeah, they’re an indie rock group from out west,” Sam said. “My sister wrote to me about them when I was away. She seemed to really like them, so I checked them out when I got back.”

“Where were you?” Harry asked.

“Iraq,” Sam said, “I served in the Gulf War.” He shuffled his feet against the car’s floor. It always made him uneasy when he told people he’d been a part of that goddamn mess. They either expected him to tell them how much he’d hated it, or worse, that he wished he was back there.  

“When was that?”

“Seven years ago,” Sam replied, shocked. “Where were you, under a rock?”

“Something like that,” Harry said. He didn’t take his eyes off the road. “I just got out of a war.”

“Which one?” Sam asked. There had been too many in the past decade.

Harry paused for a moment. “I’m afraid I can’t say,” he said. “I’m legally not allowed to tell… to tell people.”

Sam nodded. “Is that where you got the scar on your face?”

“You saw it?”

Sam frowned. “Yeah. Dude, it looks like lightening. That’s a bit hard to miss.” He added sarcastically, before worrying Harry might not like the scar – some guys were like that – he added hastily, “it makes you look tough.” He hoped he hadn’t put his foot in his mouth too bad. Maybe he shouldn’t have mentioned it.

Harry was gripping the wheel tightly. “I got it when I was a baby when –” he hesitated. “When a man tried to kill me.”

Sam didn’t quite know what to say to that, so he nodded awkwardly. They spent several hours in silence, listening to the engine and whatever came on the radio. The country was almost flying by, as they sped past fields and through small towns. Harry had a bit of a lead foot, Sam thought. He drove as if he didn’t have anything to lose.

***

“You got any family?” Sam asked.

They’d gotten food from the shitty diner next to a gas station in the middle of nowhere. Sam had insisted on paying, it was the least he could do, and Harry looked like he could use a few good meals. They’d snagged a roomy corner booth, and were taking in the peeling paint and linoleum floors. The setting sun outside lit up the dust and grime on the window, turning their table into a blood splatter of shadows. Sam took a bite of his burger. It wasn’t the worst he’d ever had.

Harry was quiet for a moment. “My parents are dead,” he said, “killed by the same man who nearly got me. But I’ve got two best mates. They’re waiting for me at home.”

“I’m sure they’ll be glad to see you,” Sam said carefully, “when you decide to go back.” He could remember, clear as yesterday, the moment he’d stepped back on American soil after his last tour. The air had tasted familiar, but there had been no one to welcome him back. He’d been uneasy for a while after, never staying in the same place too long. He supposed he still was.

“It’s hard,” Harry admitted. “Just living, you know?” He took a deep breath before continuing. “I thought I was going to die, I’d accepted it, but now I’m here. And so many people I loved are gone.”

“I was nearly blown up a few times,” Sam offered. A truth for a truth. He reached up with his left hand and pulled the dog tags he still wore out from under his shirt for Hari to see. Both sets – his, and Jordan’s – glinted in the light. “My buddy, he wasn’t as fast as I was.”

“Does it get any easier?” Harry asked. “Will I stop thinking everyone’s out to get me?”

Sam frowned. That reminded him of something a man he’d met in a veteran’s group had once said. He’d been a POW. “Were you captured?” Sam asked, “or undercover?”

“Both,” Harry said. “And lost, not knowing if I was on the run or on a mission that was taking too long. I got back alive in the end, but something – something’s definitely dead, you know?”

Sam knew.

“You learn to breathe again,” he said. “And if you need some time to yourself, take it.” He paused. “That’s what I’m doing now. Breathing.”

Harry stared at him. In that moment, Sam thought he was looking at the eyes of a someone who already knew what happened when you died. Then Harry blinked, and Sam couldn’t have said why he’d thought that.

“Do you want to stick with me for a little while?” Harry asked, eventually, “I think I could use the company.”

Sam nodded. “Yeah, kid,” he said. “I think I could use it too.”

 

They made it out of Arizona the next day, passed through Utah, and then Idaho a few days after. Sam thought they could have gone faster on the freeways, but Harry seemed determined to explore the cracked asphalt of the back-roads. Sam didn’t mind. He wasn’t in a hurry to go anywhere, and the kid needed someone beside him right now.

In Oregon, Harry was flooring it down a deserted road. The last sign Sam saw fly by had read “50 MPH”, but he didn’t think Harry cared. It was early morning, and neither of them had slept particularly well last night at the shitty motel they’d found. Harry had woken Sam up twice with nightmares. He’d been quiet this morning – probably feeling guilty, Sam thought. He knew he’d blamed himself enough when he’d first got back.

“I think the dead thing is me,” Harry said quietly. If the radio had been on, Sam wouldn’t have caught it. “When I killed the enemy, I killed myself.”

When Sam didn’t reply, Harry glanced over. Whatever he saw on Sam’s face made him ease off the gas and pull over. They sat there, parked in the grass on the side of the road with the sun glancing off the hood of the car.

“No,” Sam said at last. “No, you lived.” Sam didn’t like speeches, and wasn’t good at them, but he took a deep breath anyways. “And you’re going to keep living. One day, you’ll be ready to go back. See your friends, mourn the dead in their proper resting places.” He reached up to grip the tags hanging from his neck. His and Jordan's. “You’ve gotten out of your war, kid. It’s time to get that war out of you.”

Harry started crying, and it seemed to take him by surprise. Sam watched as he scrubbed at his eyes, trying to stop the tears. When he couldn’t manage it, Harry wrenched open his door and collapsed on the grass, leaning against the car. Sam opened his door, too, but stayed in the car. Watching as Harry started to laugh through the tears, just in case he was needed. He was damned glad he did keep an eye on things, because he’d never have believed what he’d seen otherwise. Hell, he wasn’t sure he believed it now, as the flowers grew up out of nowhere. They bloomed until Harry stopped crying, stopped laughing, until he was covered in dark red blossoms shot through with gold.

“Well, shit,” Sam said. He didn’t know what else to do.

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by this wonderful post: http://andriseup.tumblr.com/post/71312134939/harry-disappears-from-the-wizarding-world-for-a


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